Well, here we go again!!

It’s early morning Sunday in Caen, and the last minute preps for the race are taking place.. final stocking of food and clothes onto the boat, return the car.. etc.

It’s time to go racing! There is quite the parade scheduled for today. We leave the harbor around noon, and follow each other out the long canal to the locks, and then out into open water. Our actual start is expected at 5pm – so you can figure we’ll be spending quite a bit of time just waving to people. (BTW, 5pm in France is early morning in the U.S. – so by the time you folks there read this, we’ll already be out to sea.)

Matt and I had quite a bit of fun, right in the middle of everything Friday, when the crowds began to pour into the race village area – which made walking down the sidewalk nearly impossible. At one point, Matt called out to me down below on the boat that someone wanted our autographs! Well, as it turns out, a lot of folks here have a competitor’s sheet for the race crews, and they just stroll around and collect autographs!! All afternoon, whenever we walked the sidewalk, people would stop us and ask for our autographs!! What an interesting turn for a couple of Great Lakes sailors for whom the only autograph we’re usually asked to sign, is a charge receipt!

Anyway, hope you’ll have time to enjoy some tracking of the race. The weather looks to be fairly mild, without too much wind. It’s likely to be a seven or eight day race, but still full of all sorts of interesting navigation problems posed by the many cargo, ferry and fishing boats we’ll pass (as many as 200 per day,) as well as the unpredicatable currents and pockets of wind – and no wind. You’ll likely see lead changes happen often, which should make it all more exciting.

There are some contingencies in place to shorten the race, so we’ll have to see what develops. Matt and I are certainly hoping to at least round Fastnet Rock, one of the legendary pinnacles of sailing.

So for now, we’re packed up and heading to the boat. We’ll have more details to share in a week or so, when we return here to Caen.

In the meantime, here are some links from the Normandy Channel Website, should you care to track deeper. (Hit the small Union Jack icon in the upper right corner to get an English Translation.)

1. General Background on the Race
2. The Course as Viewed by long-time Competitor, Halvard Mabire
3. Dynamic Race Map
4. Rankings

We will also be doing our best to get whatever updates Matt and I can manage to send, up and on the Bodacious Dream website as well as on our BD Facebook page.

And that all said, it’s time to live the dream!!

– Dave & Matt